


Heel Head Over

by HarveyWallbanger



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: A half-hearted attempt at a fix-it story, Alcohol, Disguised as a simple meditation on guilt and shame and desire, M/M, Public Sex, References to abuse by medical professionals, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-24
Updated: 2016-06-24
Packaged: 2018-07-17 22:31:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7288684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HarveyWallbanger/pseuds/HarveyWallbanger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No peachy prayers; no trendy rechaufee.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heel Head Over

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MillicentCordelia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MillicentCordelia/gifts).



> To Millicent Cordelia, on the occasion of your natal anniversary. Many happy returns!  
> The title and summary of this story come from the David Bowie song, Strangers When We Meet.  
> I am not involved in the production of Gotham, and this school is not involved in the production of Gotham. No one pays me to do this. Do not try any of this at home. Thank you, and goodnight.

You're thinking of the line in the cartoon version of The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow: “Make for the bridge, with all of your might.” It enters your mind, odd and homelike as a strange cat creeping in through your kitchen window. You can just see the bridge, in the distance, like the skeleton of a prehistoric beast- when you hear the sound, like blubbered gasp of frustration. The car halfheartedly skids, before you take control and drive onto the shoulder of the road. A brief investigation leads you to the conclusion that that was, in fact, the spare, so you can't go any further. You shrug at the wash of deep blue air around you, take the box of chocolates from the backseat, and leave Harvey's car to lie where it fell. On the way back into the city, you eat the chocolates. Leslie wouldn't have liked them; too many soft centers. She would have frowned as her teeth cleaved pillows of crumbly raspberry cream, chocolate mousse. So, really, you've done her a favor.  
The days spend like water. It's amazing how much time you can pass doing nothing. For once, it's a pleasant nothing. You don't feel like you're putting something off, and you don't feel as though something were waiting for you. What it was, or where it was waiting, you didn't know then, and you don't know, now. You do laundry. You get rid of canned goods you were never going to eat. You dust the ceiling fans. At night, you read in bed. In the morning, you drink coffee with four spoonfuls of sugar. That's how Barbara liked it. You think of her, and feel a pleasing blankness; the shock of relief after shedding something heavy. You think of Leslie, and feel settled, as though you've woken from a dream of frantic motion to your old, safe room.  
Then, you start going out at night. You're trying on places, to see which ones fit. There's a sense that you're wandering, looking for something definite. How could you be, though? That implies desire, and you want for nothing.  
You get turned around, somehow, and you're lost. If it were daytime, you'd surely know where you are, but in the dark, nothing looks as it's supposed to. Still, there's a bar on the street you choose to walk down. At least, you think it's a bar. The door's closed, but there's a sign above it, hanging from an iron fixture. It shows a big spotted cat, like a leopard, but no words. Beneath your hand, the doorknob turns. You enter.  
There are stairs. The stairwell twists, so you can't see how far down you have to go. By the time you reach the end, you must be underground. The place is dimly lit, though you can't locate the light source, leaving you with the impression that the air's incandescent. In some places, it has a milky green tint; in others, neon pink. You stand at the bar for a moment, then sit.  
“What can I get you, handsome?” asks the bartender.  
You clear your throat. You're staring. “Beer?”  
“We've got lots of beers- any particular kind strike your fancy?” he?- they?- she?- asks.  
“That one,” you say, and point.  
“Coming right up.”  
You're aware of your embarrassment like a limb that's lost feeling. You know that it's there, but somehow, you can't use it. You look around, at the people in the booths. They all look- There isn't really a word for it. Not a nice one, that is. If anything, it's you who's abnormal here. When will they realize, and force you to leave? The bartender brings you your beer. You pay, and leave the change as a tip.  
“Much appreciated,” says the bartender, before returning to the work of the bar.  
You must be waiting for something. If you aren't, why don't you move? You definitely don't belong here. But what if you do? For most of your life, you've avoided this kind of place. Maybe it was precisely because you knew you belonged there. It's both much simpler and more complicated, now that you can look at it head-on. Of course, it's because of what Strange did to you. Even you know that. And you know that Strange isn't God, and that he has no power over you, and certainly not the power to absolve you of thirty-eight years of guilt- but you want him to. You want it to be true. For once, wanting seems to be enough.  
The voice is the hiss of a slow leak. “Hello, old friend.”  
You turn. “Hello, Oswald.”  
He blinks. Not for the first time, you're aware of how long his eyelashes are. He narrows his eyes. “I never expected to find you in a place like this!” He clucks his tongue and wags his finger at you. “You are just full of surprises, Jim Gordon!”  
“Sit down,” you say, “I'll buy you a drink.”  
His mouth falls open, but he nods, and with some effort, perches on the edge of the barstool.  
“Would you be more comfortable in a booth?”  
He narrows his eyes again. “Not that I don't appreciate it, but why are you being so nice to me, all of a sudden?”  
“I had a religious experience.”  
He frowns. “Oh.”  
“Not like that. God spoke to me, but it wasn't God. It was Professor Strange.”  
Something odd passes over Oswald's features, and it bothers you that you can't define it. “I'll take that drink, now.”  
You order a glass of red wine for Oswald, and another beer for yourself. You clink the bottle against his glass. “Salud,” you say. That's what Harvey says. “What did he do to you?” you ask Oswald.  
“You, first,” Oswald spits, and takes a long, loud swallow of his wine, his throat working, his eyes hard over the rim of the glass.  
“He said that he was God, and that he was freeing me from my guilt.”  
“That's it?”  
“I was restrained and heavily drugged at the time, but that's more or less it.”  
“What he did to me wasn't so different,” Oswald says coolly.  
“It had to have been worse, or you wouldn't be looking at me that way.”  
Oswald makes a face. “He really did mess you up.”  
“Why do you say that?”  
“This isn't you.”  
“What isn't me?”  
“You can't have forgotten. You don't forget. You always know who you are. You just learn to look at yourself differently. Until it hurts to see yourself as you really are. So, then, you have to look away. You have to make yourself do the opposite of what you want to do, but your brain is screaming at you, the whole time. Even when you try to be good, it hurts. But you can't be bad, because that would be unbearable.”  
You put your hand on his. It's cold. “'I'm sorry.”  
He snatches his hand away, frowns into his wine. “I don't want your pity. I didn't tell you that to make you feel sorry for me. You need to know what you did, what you abandoned me to.”  
“You're right. I wanted you to go away forever, so that I could forget about you.”  
“Why do you hate me so much?” he asks quietly.  
“It's like a dream I had,” you muse, “I remember all of it, but it wasn't me. I know how I felt in the dream, but I don't feel that way, now.”  
“What does that mean?”  
“It means what I said it does. It made sense to feel that way, in the dream, but it doesn't anymore.”  
“When I find him, I'm going to kill him.”  
“They took him away. I don't know where. Maybe Blackgate. Maybe the newer place, upstate. They might have even put him in Arkham.”  
“He needs to be in hell.”  
“For what he did to you, yeah.”  
“Stop it,” Oswald snaps.  
“Stop what?”  
“Stop understanding me,” Oswald shakes his head, “This isn't you.”  
“It is, now.”  
“It won't last forever. Something's going to happen, and you'll be back to normal.”  
You shrug. “I kind of like feeling this way.”  
“What's it like?”  
“Like I don't have to do anything I don't want to do.”  
“That must be nice,” he sneers.  
“You do what you want, all the time.”  
“I do a lot of things I don't want to do, Jim.”  
“Like what?” you ask, because you can't think of any.  
He leans in and hisses, “I went to Arkham for you. You're the reason I was in that hellhole. You. You did this to me as much as Strange.”  
“What happened to you, though? You're not like me. You seem the same.”  
He shakes his head. “I'm not. For months I was...” he looks at the ceiling, “lost. I didn't know who I was, just that the person I'd been was wrong. I never used to feel guilty about the things I did, because I knew why I did them. But then, that wasn't good enough. I didn't have a right to defend myself, to survive, to prosper. It was okay for everyone else but me. That was really why I was being punished: for being myself; not like good, like other people. And I really wanted to be good. I felt like it was the only way to make people love me, know who I truly was- though even I didn't know. But something happened.”  
“What?”  
“I'm not going to talk about that. And now,” he grins, “I'm back to me!”  
“So, who are you?”  
“I'm the Penguin,” he says.  
“But you always hated that name.”  
“How can you hate what you really are? It's sort of pointless, don't you think?” He waves his empty glass at the bartender.  
“I don't think it's you. Or it's not all of you, anyway.”  
“You don't know me anymore,” he says, without malice, without very much feeling, at all.  
“Would you let me? Get to know you?”  
He makes a disgusted face. “What the hell do you want from me, anyway, Jim? Haven't I suffered for you enough?”  
“Probably. Yes. It doesn't have to be that way anymore.”  
“Why? Because you say so?”  
You blink. “Well, yeah.”  
“It looks like you learned something from Strange's impersonation of divinity. Are you still a cop? Someone told me you were, like, a bounty hunter or something, now.”  
“A bounty hunter? No. I'm sort of between things, now. I think I probably could go back to being a cop. I just don't know if I want to.”  
“Come work for me. Be in charge of my security.”  
“Really?”  
“No,” he snorts, “I know I can't trust you with anything important.”  
“So, why are you talking to me? Why are you sitting so close?”  
“I said that I couldn't trust you with anything important. This means nothing to me.”  
It hurts, somehow. You're not sure why. You think that, once, you would have known the answer, but the ability to simply intuit a thing like that has evaporated. The pain is there, but its origin is obscured. “Don't say that.” Why shouldn't he say that?  
“This isn't real, you know.” There's amusement in his voice, but pity, as well. You know, now, why he doesn't like pity.  
“It is.” You're not angry. You can't remember the last time you felt angry. Maybe you should be, but you aren't. You just want him to stop saying things like that. Everything matters. Even if it doesn't last. You think of Barbara, and you feel the creak of an old injury. Something that hurt you, once, and your body remembers, even if you don't. You think of Lee, and it's a new wound. A tender, pink crush of flesh. It could split again, bleed. You'd put your hand over it, if you only knew where it was. And this- what's this? A broken bone. Internal bleeding. Something you can't see, and can barely feel, but you know is serious. And you did it to yourself. It seemed like a good idea at the time. “It is,” you say again.  
“So, what do you want to do, Jim?” he asks, drinking the rest of the wine, licking his lips, “I'm the same person I've always been. You know what I do. You know what I am. Do you know what you are?”  
It's not even a question you want to answer. You seem to be lacking the things you'd need to answer it. “I guess I want to find out.”  
“Well, good,” he stands, “Good luck with that.”  
“You're going?”  
“Yeah,” he sneers, “I don't feel like socializing anymore.”  
“The stairs,” you say without thinking, “I could walk you up the stairs.”  
“Fuck you,” he says with such venom- you know you deserve it, but it hurts.  
“Please.”  
Another strange current passes over him, and he says, teeth grit, “Fine.”  
The staircase is too narrow to walk two abreast, so you follow him. If he falls, he'll fall on you. He grips the railing, and pulls himself along, frown deepening slightly when he steps down with his bad leg.  
Outside, the midnight damp has come down. It can't be good for his leg. “Can I walk you home?”  
“What is this, junior high school? I can call a car, Jim. Just stop it, already,” he mutters.  
“Stop what?”  
“The whole mind-fuck thing doesn't suit you; you're not built for it.”  
“I'm not trying to mind-fuck you.”  
“Maybe you want to fuck me the other way.”  
“What if I did?”  
He looks at you like you've struck him.  
“You're not coming home with me,” he says, folding his arms over his chest.  
“I could bring you home with me,” you offer. He could sleep with you, in your bed. You're glad you washed your sheets.  
“What a romantic you are,” he says bitterly, “But I'm not. If you want me, do it right here.”  
Automatically, you look around. There's no one on the street. “All right. But not so out in the open.” He lets you lead him into an alley.  
There, in the dark, he looks up at you. He says your name, and he sounds different, somehow. His mouth is soft, and so is his skin. Under your hands, he's warm. His heart's beating fast. He smells like the alcohol he's sweating out, combustion, metal. He might have fired a gun recently. He could have killed someone today. You shouldn't want to touch someone like that. You slip your hand under his jacket, down the line of his waist. You can almost feel his body through his clothes; he's padded unto distortion, but you remember. You remember how thin he was, when you saw him at Arkham, worn down and ragged. You couldn't look at him, then, but you can feel him, now. He lets you. He lets you touch him. You warm your hand, and slip it into his pants.  
It takes about thirty seconds. He has his arms around you, and his mouth at your throat. You wipe your hand on a bar napkin, and then you kiss him again. He's holding on tightly. You're willing to let him stay that way until he decides he wants to move. He seems like he might never move. His breathing is even. Maybe he's fallen asleep. You could call a cab. Take him home with you.  
But then, he does move. He looks up at you again, and you're about to say something, what, you don't know, when he pulls away. He straightens his clothes. “Thanks, Jim,” he says, “It's been fun.”  
You're not angry, or upset, or even all that surprised. What you're most aware of feeling is the absence of him. His shape and his weight against you, the heat of his body. It's as though he left a physical impression. An empty space. How long will it remain? After he leaves, you stand there for a while, waiting for him to come back, waiting for the depression of him to fill itself up again, with you. He doesn't. It doesn't.  
When you wake, the next day, you're not entirely sure that it wasn't a dream. It has the quality of a fantasy, or of something you heard of happening to someone else. In the pocket of your jacket, you find a napkin that says “The Liberator”. This must have been the name of the bar. When you're dressed, you walk the same way that you did last night. After a certain point, though, nothing looks meaningful. The buildings might be those you passed at night, but you go too far in one direction, maybe not far enough in another, and come up with nothing. After the sun sets, you try again, thinking that the darkness is an essential component of the landscape. You begin to feel the warm pat of memory, and your heart beats faster as you near, you're sure, the place you left.  
But you're no closer an hour later, spent walking up and down the same streets, considering and dismissing anew each stranger you see as a source of enlightenment. Those who look unlikely wouldn't know what you're asking. If you asked them, those who look as though they would know the bar would then know you. Somehow, you're not ready for anyone to know you like that. Not even strangers.  
You go home. You take off your clothes, and get into bed naked. You think about Oswald coming in your hand. You sleep, and you dream of getting lost in your own apartment. Dr. Strange knows the way out, but mocks you for asking.  
The next morning, you call Harvey.  
“Where's my car?” Harvey demands, then clears his throat, “So, how did things go with Lee?”  
“They didn't.”  
“Shit. I'm sorry.”  
“Don't worry about it. Have you ever heard of a place called The Liberator?”  
There comes no answer.  
“Hello?”  
“I preface this by saying that I only even know that place exists because I had to bust the owner a couple of times when I worked in Vice.”  
“Okay.”  
“I'll take you there.”  
“You can just give me directions.” It's nice of Harvey to offer to accompany you, but if he's uncomfortable, you don't want to make it worse.  
“It's easier to just show you.”  
“Okay.”  
“Come by my place. After work.”  
“I will.”  
“Are you sure, Jim?”  
“I have to know, Harvey.”  
Harvey seems to know where he's going, but he's driving on the same path that you, yourself, have walked. You don't understand what could make the difference.  
“It's a weird little street,” Harvey says, “You'd miss it if you didn't know exactly where to look.”  
It's a plausible explanation, but you don't entirely believe it. Then, you see the painted sign, and you feel both the warm excitement of the known attained, and the flat clap of disappointment. You were almost starting to hope that it had been a dream.  
“I'll wait out here,” Harvey says.  
“Come with me. I'll buy you a drink.”  
Harvey gives you a long, weird look, but turns off the car. You walk ahead of him, leading him down the stairs. You don't know if you expected Oswald be there, waiting for you- to have never left- but you don't see him, and you again feel the shape of him in your arms. It's cold, now.  
You sit with Harvey in a booth. You face the stairs.  
“That's my limit,” Harvey says, and slides his empty glass away from him.  
“Really?”  
“Yeah.” He's already standing.  
“You sure you don't want-”  
“Look, Jim, I didn't mind bringing you here, but this isn't a place where either of us should be.”  
“Why?”  
But Harvey doesn't answer. “Call me sometime,” he says, and you watch him walk back upstairs.  
You're not sure, but you think that the same song has been playing the whole time you've been here. The air is soft, faintly green, like the last time. The washes of darkness are deep indigo. You could stay here, for a long time, in the soft fist of this darkness.  
“Are you looking for something, or just looking?” a waiter asks you.  
“Just looking,” you say, and they smile at you, leave your beer and take away the empty bottle.  
You might be getting drunk. You're not sure, anymore, what it's like. You've felt sort of drunk since you were in Arkham. Breaking like a veil of foam on a wave. Breaking.  
“Jim. You are a glutton for punishment.” Oswald maneuvers into the booth, across from you.  
“Is that what it was?”  
“What?”  
“Was it a punishment? If it was, it wasn't a very good one.”  
Oswald gives him a sharp look. “You liked it?”  
“Yeah. I did. It was nice.”  
“How was it nice?”  
“I liked holding you. Touching you.”  
“What's wrong with you?”  
“I'm not sure. Do you want to do it again?”  
“What are you doing?”  
“I want to know if you want me to touch you again.”  
He places his hand on the table. “Touch me here. Touch me like this.”  
“That's what you want?”  
“Yeah, Jim. Hold my fucking hand like you want to ask me to the prom.”  
You hesitate. You're not sure why. Because he's a dangerous man. But never to you. You've never actually been in danger from him.  
“I thought so,” he says. You've hesitated too long. He's moving.  
“Wait.” You put your hand over his. He looks at you. Shocked. His eyes are no particular color in the dark; just pale. He opens his mouth. You wrap your fingers around his hand. Like a film rewinding, he folds himself backwards into the booth again.  
“Jim,” he says.  
“Wait,” you say. “Stay,” you say.


End file.
